The students union election in DAV-PG college here turned bloody on Friday as bloody clashes between rival groups of Akhil Bharatiya Vidhyarthi Parishad (ABVP) erupted. Two former Presidents of the DAV college students union and the official candidate of ABVP for the post of President this year suffered injuries in the pre-election violence in the biggest college of the State in terms of student numbers. The students clashed when the supporters of independent candidate Nikhil Sharma were taking out a rally in the college.

The  open for all melee broke out between the supporters of the ABVP and the breakaway group which has made Nikhil Sharma its candidate for the coveted post of the President of the college.

When the students began to indulge in violence, the police intervened and dispersed the students.

The police personnel cane-charged the students in order to control them. In the clash, former Presidents of DAV students union Rahul Lara and Subham Simalti sustained injuries. The official candidate of the ABVP, Sagar Tomar, too, received injuries along some other supporters.

The injured students were rushed to the Pandit Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Coronation hospital and CMI hospital.  Former President of the DAV -PG college students union and former district coordinator of ABVP, Paras Goyal, blamed the leaders of the breakaway group to initiate violence. “The opponents got perplexed after the huge rally in support of ABVP candidate yesterday.

Today, they retorted to violence in desperation. Our candidate Sagar Tomar sustained serious injuries when he was attacked by goons,’’ he said.

The supporters of the Nikhil Sharma said that they were attacked by the ABVP supporters when they were planning to take out the procession.

They alleged that the police acted in partisan manner and supported the ABVP members.

It is pertinent to mention here that some former Presidents of the DAV College belonging to the ABVP wanted that the organisation should field Nikhil Sharma as its official candidate but when the ABVP leaders declared Sagar Tomar as official candidate, these former Presidents became rebellious and fielded Nikhil Sharma as an independent candidate. On Thursday, ABVP suspended the rebel leaders along with Nikhil Sharma.

Elections to be held as scheduled-DAV administration

The administration of DAV-PG College has said that it is fully prepared to conduct free and fair election on September 9. The election in charge of the college, Gopal Chhetri, told The Pioneer that the elections would be held as per the schedule.

Terming the violence unfortunate, he said that the heavy police deployment prevented the situation from going out of control. Chhetri was of the view that things would have taken a turn for more violence if heavy police deployment was not made.

He, however, claimed that the clashes between the students occurred outside the college campus.